


Between here and there

by linana (carpediorma)



Category: Handsome Devil (2016)
Genre: Attempt at Humor, Bickering, Canon-Typical Behavior, Future Fic, Internalized Homophobia, Loss of Parent(s), M/M, Pining, Repression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-20
Updated: 2021-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-27 03:41:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30116613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpediorma/pseuds/linana
Summary: Victor never thought he would be seeing so much of his former classmates. Granted, he also used to believe he would make it into the Ireland national rugby team, so maybe a pinch of salt with his expectations wouldn’t be a bad thing.
Relationships: Victor/Weasel (Handsome Devil)





	Between here and there

**Author's Note:**

> My quest for writing fanfiction about ~~~the wooooorst dudes continues. Weasel is the devil's spawn, but by god, I find the actor who plays him very attractive. Victor’s characterization is practically non-existent except for intervening in bullying situations a tad too late and being fit.   
> I had so much fun writing this, I'm disgusted with myself and my lack of integrity.  
> That’s all, thanks for reading!

Victor never thought he would be seeing so much of his former classmates. Granted, he also used to believe he would make it into the Ireland national rugby team, so maybe a pinch of salt with his expectations wouldn’t be a bad thing.

His life might not be what he imagined when he was younger, but he refuses to commiserate. He’s making decent money at his dad’s life insurance company, customers immediately take a liking to him because he’s excellent at pretending to care, naturally predisposed to appear good-natured and understanding. Perks of being a former captain, he supposes. 

His dad isn’t all that impressed with him not going pro, but there are worse cases and he makes sure everyone knows.  _ At least you’re not like that Weasel boy _ , a sigh, then a slight pause. _ John would die all over again if he saw him now _ , he’d say with a disapproving shake of his head. If he needs to heap scorn on someone else’s son to deal with the disappointment his own son brings him, that’s fine. Victor doesn’t care about what his father deems respectable or not. 

Frankly, Weasel’s situation is so pathetic that it deserves ridiculing. Adulthood came down _ hard  _ on him, his golden years well past behind him. 

To no one’s surprise, except maybe Weasel himself since he’s always been the utmost image of self-entitlement, he hasn’t been able to hold down any job. Which landed him in his cousin’s sex shop, located right around the corner of Victor’s office. It’s an unfortunate situation for everyone involved.

If Victor were Ned, he would find Weasel and knock out his teeth, but since Ned is Ned, he’s satisfied with posting call-outs on his Twitter account, getting dangerously close to exposing him without actually revealing his name. He’s become an internet sensation throughout the years, making covers with Connor and getting a ridiculous number of views. They’re not even that good.

It’s not that Victor follows them either, it's just that his little sister is obsessed with —and he quotes— their beautiful love story. Victor doesn’t bother telling her about all the fighting and the outing, little but vital details that would taint the fairy tale she’s created in her head. 

She’s still young.

“You understand you can’t just barge in whenever you feel like it, right?” Weasel leans his hip against the desk and carefully deposits a plastic bag in front of Victor. He doesn’t answer, just keeps looking at him expectantly. “What is _that_?” Victor asks as he pokes the package with his pen. There’s a box inside.

“Happy birthday,” Weasel says with a stupid dimpled smile plastered on his face. 

“Oh, I didn’t know you made enough money to afford such niceties,” Victor says, deadpan. Then he theatrically puts a hand in his chest, “I’m deeply touched.”

Weasel pushes the bag in his direction, a malicious glint in his eyes. “Open it, buddy.” 

Victor eyes him with distrust and takes the box in his hands, slowly peeling off the newspaper that covers it. He opens it and immediately drops the lid, hiding it inside his drawer. Karen, whose desk is dangerously close to his, is looking in their direction and the last thing he needs is for her to witness this.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Victor says, not very surprised. He should’ve known Weasel’s new job would’ve provided him new ammunition. 

“I hope you enjoy it,” he winks and lets out a loud laugh. Every single head in the office turns to glare at him and he seems satisfied by the attention,  _ obviously _ . 

The joke’s on Weasel, though, because Victor _ does  _ enjoy it. It takes him a week to finally decide whether to use it, but then he thinks  _ fuck it _ and treats himself to some me-time on Saturday night, it’s not like he has anything better to do. 

If this product is anything to judge from, Weasel might actually have a bright future in the business. 

He hadn’t planned for Weasel to know. In fact, he had planned to hide it for the rest of his life and marry the first nondescript pretty girl who wouldn’t care about him living it up a little on the side. His future would be as green as an artificial lawn, the sweet smell of Chanel D’or and hair products.  A big house, a nice car and if he’s feeling particularly charitable, maybe a kid. That kind of normalcy that’s not normal at all. 

Unfortunately, Weasel had a bad habit of turning out by his apartment whenever he felt like it with no prior warning.  Unfortunately, he managed to arrive while he was in the middle of business with a fella, owner of a shy smile and eyes the same blue as the pool his nondescript future wife would sunbathe in front of.  Unfortunately, he took the news as well as an idiot like him could and then decided to stick around. 

At least, he had the decency to flee from the scene and let him do his thing. 

“I’m going to stop opening the door,” Victor says as he eyes Weasel’s shirt. There are at least three new little holes in it. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. “Just warning you, any day now. I swear by my aunt Patti’s life.”

Weasel raises an eyebrow. “You hate your aunt Patti,” he says. Of course, that’s the thing he focuses on. 

“I hate funerals more,” Victor explains. He thinks Weasel might have owned that shirt since their Woodhill days.  


“Oh, I  _ know _ . Remember when you puked in my dad’s?” Weasel is about to add something more, but Victor tells him to cut it off. Weasel has this weird fascination with his father and Victor supposes it might be a product of vacancy overcoming his memories and filling his head with fabricated ones because the man sucked. Many of Weasel’s faults and issues originated from his relationship with his father, and that was even before he had gone and died. 

“What are you doing here?”

“My mom walked in on me watching  _ Re-animator  _ and said she was worried about me,” Weasel rolls his eyes. His mother is concerned his love for eighties’ horror movies is a gateway door to becoming a murderer. “And then she started crying and I had to get out.”

“And you came here.” 

“And I came here.” 

Victor doesn’t go to Weasel’s cousin’s sex shop. Victor is a self-respecting person who buys whatever he needs over the internet, especially when it comes to that. 

If Victor spends the entire week looking for a stupid book about the biopolitical ramifications of monsters in media because it’s unavailable on Amazon and if he walks into that god-forsaken place to leave it behind the counter while Weasel is out in the back for his smoke break, well, he’s just trying to return the favor. He knows the freak will enjoy it just as much. 

“We should start an arrangement,” Weasel tells him from where he’s sprawled in Victor’s couch, Jeff Goldblum peeling off his nails as if they were stickers in his shitty computer. The screen keeps freezing and producing a series of worrying noises that make Weasel huff indignantly. With an owner like Weasel’s, that thing has surely been through a lot. 

“Okay, that doesn’t sound ominous at all,” Victor adjusts his glasses but keeps his eyes on the spreadsheets in front of him, wondering when and where the fuck did all of them were produced from. He swears those things multiply whenever he’s not looking, one blink and they’re beyond control.

“I’m serious,” Weasel closes his computer with a frustrated slap and suddenly sits on the couch, so Victor can see the top of his head from where he’s sitting over the table. Weasel’s hair, that mop of dark curls, is another uncontrollable thing. 

“Are you going to try and recruit me into a pyramid scheme?” 

“What about being friends with benefits?” Weasel cranes his neck and Victor can see his face now, not a trace of humor in his eyes. 

“We’re not friends,” Victor answers. “We’re acquaintances, at most. And that’s if I’m being generous. Otherwise, I would describe it as more of a forced entry.” 

“It took  _ two _ buses to get here. I made you dinner because I know you suck at feeding yourself when you have too much work piled up,” Weasel says. “It’s a Saturday night and I’m here when I could be literally anywhere else. Don’t you think that means something?” 

“I think that sounds like a you problem, lad,” Victor shrugs and raises his eyebrows. He can’t deal with this situation right now because he’s  _ fucking _ busy. All for some measly mac and cheese. 

“Alright, when was the last time you went out and met someone? Too fucking long because that job of yours keeps sucking the life out of you,” Weasel argues. “And all the girls I’ve tried hooking up with lately were put off.” 

“Can’t exactly blame them, can we?” 

“Go fuck yourself, Victor,” Weasel grimaces. “I’m proposing this because with you is different. You know me, you’ve seen me at my low.” 

“I’ve seen you put others at their low with psychological abuse and physical violence,” Victor reminds him. “As of now, and I’m saddened to be the bearer of such news, you’re lower than low.”

“Well, you saw me bullying all those guys, yet you never tried to stop me from doing it.”

“Sorry, was I supposed to be your babysitter?” Victor frowns. 

“Obviously not, you would’ve done a terrible job. It’s just that you don’t get to act all self-righteous while you witnessed the damage I was making and decided to look the other way,” Weasel says heatedly. 

He’s rendered speechless by that. “You’re unbelievable, did you know that?” Victor manages out, hoping it placates Weasel. He really needs to get back to the fucking spreadsheets.

“Listen, there are two types of people in this world: assholes like me and indifferent, apathetic douches like you. At least I had, like, initiative.” Weasel says.

“In what world being a bully count as having initiative?” Victor asks incredulously. “You’re  _ fucking _ unbelievable.”

As Weasel asks him what is a gigabyte, Victor realizes he made the right choice by accompanying him to buy a new computer. While Weasel is technologically illiterate, he knows his way around these things. 

“Don’t even think about it, that thing will start lagging as soon as you set foot out of the store,” he says as Weasel inspects one of the cheaper ones. “This one is more like it,” he points to another and pretends not to notice the way Weasel winces as he eyes the price. 

The thing is his family had been a privileged one, extremely well-off. A private education, expensive clothes and exotic destinations for the holidays type of family, just like Victor’s. Also, the thing is, since John’s death, both Weasel and his mom had lived their lives as if they had money to burn, which was true, but only for a certain period of time. 

As Weasel goes back to the cheapest one, Victor decides it wouldn’t be all that bad to make him a loan. He’s applying for another part-time job which requires a computer and there’s only so much he can do with his old one, ancient enough that it might as well start typing in hieroglyphs. 

He’s so alarmingly underqualified that only his ridiculous confidence in himself could save him. That and a functioning computer. Victor has volunteered to teach him the basics during the weekends until the day of his interview arrives, only because Weasel getting the job means getting less of him in his life. 

Weasel calls him three days before the interview to let him know he got the job. Victor doesn’t know why he didn’t just come over as he usually does. 

“It’s actually a trial period until they can see what I’m capable of, the fuckers will be paying much less than what I was expecting during this time,” he goes silent for so long that Victor thinks the call has ended. “Also, I’m pretty sure I only got it because the recruiter wanted me to fuck her.”

Victor gestures to the customer sitting at his desk to wait for him a little. “That’s a good thing, isn’t it?” Victor says and he isn’t sure what he’s referring to. 

A pause. “She was like sixty,” another pause. “Besides, I’m not interested in  _ her _ .”

“Oh, you finally found a chick with a strong enough stomach?”

“Fuck off,” Weasel says. “I’m in a good mood, don’t ruin it.” 

“Well, then, enjoy your day and go after whoever got you hot and bothered,” Victor says, accidentally making eye contact with his father and his scowl and his tight-lipped mouth. How does that one manage to find several women with strong enough stomachs? 

“I’m _ trying _ ,” Weasel sighs and the line goes dead. 

After Weasel, quite inexplicably, is made a permanent employee at his new job, he takes Victor to a bar to celebrate. A gay bar, the one that bears a terrible innuendo as its name. The people who had to make the neon sign must’ve been horrified.

“I’m going to get laid with or without you,” Weasel says and Victor wonders if that’s some weird key code to a threesome invitation or something. 

Victor is exhausted after a nightmarish week at his job and Weasel doesn’t seem all that festive either, too busy angrily downing drink after drink. He doesn’t approach anyone and, probably because of their faces, no one approaches them. 

At three A.M. Victor decides it’s best to leave and Weasel tags along, too fluthered to take the bus home by himself. 

Victor sits on the bathtub as Weasel pukes his guts out. “Here, drink some water,” he says, handing him a plastic bottle. Weasel attempts to grab it but the movement is way off and he ends up grazing Victor’s wrist, fingers lightly touching the sensitive skin there. 

He leans in closer and lowers his voice, “I was so happy with the job thing. So, so, so happy that I would’ve tried to suck your dick if you were in front of me.” 

“Alright,” Victor stutters. “That’s nice of you, I guess.” 

“I want to suck your dick. I want to hold your hand,” and he actually tries to do it but his hand falls limply against his own thigh. “I think about you all the time,” Weasel adds with a secretive tone. 

Victor doesn’t know what to say and before he can decide himself, Weasel falls asleep. 

“It wasn’t a confession,” Weasel says. 

“It was pretty much a confession,” Victor says. “Believe me, I was the conscious one.”

Victor hadn’t planned to address it at all, but since Weasel had brought up the friends with benefits thing again.

“Exactly, I was under the effects of alcohol,” Weasel insists. “It didn’t mean anything.”

“I mean, how can we ever be sure?”

“I don’t feel that way for you, lad.” 

“You do, in a way, since this whole friends with benefits ordeal do imply a fair amount of dick sucking.” 

“Do you ever take anything seriously?” Weasel asks, and then scowls.

“It’s just that I think it’s kind of a false advertisement. Proposing a no strings attached deal while supposedly harboring all those feelings,” Victor says. “Besides, in all this time, you’ve never considered that I might simply not be interested.”

Weasel looks at him for an unnervingly long time, sizing him. His eyes get stupidly intense sometimes, as if he’s trying to communicate things with them that his mouth isn’t able to say. Victor isn’t one for subtleties, so tough luck.

“That’s not true,” he boasts.

Victor doesn’t like the way his smile looks almost predatory.


End file.
